Hi guys, Just wanted to give you a heads up and let you know that I found a mill in Utah that is willing to ship flour directly from them to our front doors in the new USPS flat rate boxes. They are called Central Milling and you can check out their flower selection here: http://www.centralmilling.com. I've been baking with their organic AP and their High Mountain Organic High Gluten Flour and both are performing fabulously! I'll post some pics on my blog soon (http://insearchoftheperfectpie.wordpress.com), but I thought maybe you guys would be interested in some previously commercial-only flour, direct from the mill.

the person who replied to me is Nicky Giusto... very friendly folks. they said its $26 for 20# flour shipped. USPS flat rate box is a great idea for this sort of thing. It is a little pricey but I'm going to give it a try.

Hey guys, just wanted to let you know that Nicky was kind enough to give me a call back and chat for a few, figured I would fill you in. I asked for his advice on a good substitute for a 00 flour. He told me that they are debuting a couple 00 blends at the pizza show in vegas in a week or two, and will be ready for shipping in a few weeks. They are doing a regular and long fermentation version that is a bit stronger. He seemed pretty excited about it, and so am I. In the meantime he said that his unmalted artisan bakers craft bakes up very similar to it at high temps, so that is what I am going to try for now. While chating somehow we got onto the subject of repackaging/milling for others and he informed me they make the organic 365 all purpose flour for whole foods, which makes a killer baguette that is their malted bee hive. They also make the bulk bin flour at whole foods on the west coast, along with some of their pancake mixes and such. Also many costcos are carrying their 2/10# bags of AP, labeled central milling. Thats all I got, my flour should be here next week and I will post up some pictures as soon as I make them. -marc

From what I have heard Keith Guisto is the mastermind in the development of all of the flour formulations in both companies, and is one heck of a baker. The Guisto flour company is an older company that still has some of Keith's family running it, but he has spun off to make Central Milling. I believe this happened some time ago, but I am not sure when Keith Left Guisto and started his new company. You will notice that all the new flour formulations are coming out of Central Milling.

Yep, Keith is now a Central Milling man and has entrusted most of the day operations, consultations, etc, to Nick "Nicky" Giusto. There are still some Giustos working at the Giusto Flour Co, but the company has become more of a corporate venture and Keith and Nick split off to continue their families business model/tradition. The mills are all in Utah, but the distribution is all run out of the Northern California Bay Area.

Incidentally, Central Milling now sells their organic all-purpose flour at Costco. It is packaged in a pair of 10 lb bags, and is available in one of the two Costco stores in Houston... don't know about other outlets. I really like the stuff, and would be interested in a high gluten flour from them.

I like the flour a lot so far but still all testing in my home oven.. which is not going to yield the best results. I am doing 60% hydration with long room temperature rises and this is working pretty well. Still working on getting this deck oven fixed to do some NY style testing there.

Hey all, well, I said I would report back so here it is. This flour and I started out on the wrong foot, as I think I overfired my oven a bit for the first couple tests. I was aiming for 1 minute neapolitan bakes as it was my intention to use it for the style. Anyways things got a little to hot, or what i took away from it is that the flour wouldn't quite stand up to the heat, as it was charring too quickly. Part of that might have been my fault, with the excessive heat, but I also think that the flour was so fresh, it may have had something to do with it. The flour does make an incredibly smooth dough, much like what I experience with the all trumps ubub. This particular batch, I used 62% hydration,2.25% salt,5% varasano starter, and a 24 hour room temp rise, at about 65 degrees. I did indeed get the oven really hot tonight and was baking at about 1:15. Anyhow to say the least things turned out great, and I was very pleased with this batch. The dough had great handling characteristics and held up to the long fermentation very well. The finished crust, had good structure, a very good crisp, and great flavor. I am very happy with the results of tonights test and would recommend this flour to anyone with a fairly to very high heat source. I think it would, and will make an outstanding 3 minute or so NY/coal style. Here are the results, cento ROA's, genovese basil from our aerogarden, sicilian sea salt and olive oil, formaggio fresh mozz on 4, and mandara bufula on 2. Can you tell which 2? gosh I love that stuff. -marc

have you tried the type 00 reinforced flour? they sent me 20# of this by accident when I re-ordered the high gluten. I am sure it is good stuff but probably no good for 550 home oven. I may be doing some grill experiments.